


there is a diner on the edge of the forest

by lovebots (orphan_account)



Category: Archie Comics, Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: Drabble, Gen, Magic, headcanons, minor -ships but its not the main part of the story, pop tate is riverdales ancient guardian holy shit, setting study???, supernatural themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-26
Updated: 2017-04-26
Packaged: 2018-10-24 03:43:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10733430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/lovebots
Summary: To walk into it is to distort time: to recall memories long forgotten, to feel spirits long gone, to fade into the bittersweet past.





	there is a diner on the edge of the forest

**Author's Note:**

> This is pretty much a bunch of headcanons i have about magical Riverdale that i wrote down last night. Enjoy, etc.

There's a diner on the side of the road. There's a diner bathed in red light, and to walk into it is to distort time: to recall memories long forgotten, to feel spirits long gone, to fade into the bittersweet past.

There is a diner trapped in time and space. It has been witness to love and loss and disaster. It cycles through day after day, year after year, decade after decade. But the old man behind the counter still looks the same.

There is no beginning of Pop's, and no forseeable end. After all, how could you destroy something that holds so many secrets?

One family tried. One person was lost along the way.

The residents of Riverdale know that it's far more than a diner. They know that it's the blockade between the town and the forest, and whatever evil lies within. Pop is the protector, the guardian.

And for once, he's not alone.

There is a diner, and inside there is a boy who sees everything. He's been stopping by almost constantly since he was old enough, and when everything collapsed, the diner was his place of refuge. He's comfortable with the spirits that come late at night when no one else is there. Long forgotten, they echo conversations from decades ago, accompanied by Pop's milkshakes.

Riverdale residents know that there's something practically otherwordly about Pop's food. A sip of a milkshake brings back floods of memories, good and bad, so vivid it feels like your childhood is happening right in front of you. Pop swirls a little bit of magic in with the syrup, they suppose. That's normal, though. Magic is a relatively everyday occurence in Riverdale.

Most families are average, but they take precautions to avoid magic getting near their houses. There's a shop on Main Street that sells amulets and silver knockers and handheld mirrors to use if the need arises.

There are many who aren't normal, though. Those who carefully file their fangs before school, those who are mysteriously good at chemistry, those who keep their hair long to cover up their pointy ears.

They are the reason that the school is closed every full moon and that some people swear they hear howling during football games. They are the reason that high-collar shirts are often in style and mechanical pencils are used to avoid a wooden stake incident.

Being a magical town has its disanvantages. They grew personal when it was discovered that Polly Cooper was a changeling trying to rejoin the Seelie Court. They grew deadly when the Unseelie Court tried to burn down Pop's in an attempt to open the hellmouth and flood the town with spirits.

After that, Pop and his assistant kept a close eye on the Blossoms. They could feel a tension growing thanks to the ripple effect of Jason's death.

The diner attracts lots of customers. Pop sometimes asks the boy if he is safe. If the people here are able to be trusted. He smiles and replies no, because he would be able to tell if something had happened to one of them—namely, if "that boy Jug loves" Archie had become properly initiated into the football team by becoming a werewolf. Or if Betty had bothered the Seelie Court for the last time. Or if Veronica had lost control and gone on a blood rampage.

"They're fine," Jughead says. "You can trust them."

Pop wonders if Jughead can sense his worry.

Because there is a diner and it is this boy's only home. He grew up in a household torn apart by his father. Like him, his father could see everything, and it destroyed him. So he washed it away with alcohol, unable to handle the weight of the town.

There is a diner on the edge of the world, and Pop doesn't know how long he can take it.

Day after day, he serves spirit after spirit, collects memories left on the counter and gives them to Jughead for his stories. Jughead suspects that Pop is turning into another one of them, that he will fade away and leave Riverdale undefended from the darkness in the forest.

And then Jughead will have to be there.

He's supported by people who have pushed against Riverdale's boundaries. A witch and a vampire, fighting to stay together despite the rivalries. A mortal boy who's an honorary member of a werewolf pack.

And then there's Jughead. A seer, a medium, doomed to sadness by all of the things he's seen and the impending task of guarding the town.

He thinks he can do it.

There is a diner bathed in red light where the vampires and witches go out to play, where the mortals and mediums touch, where whispers of memory dance in the late hours of the night in the ghostly light of the moon.

There is Riverdale.


End file.
